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Meghan stared at her twin sister's pale and lifeless body through a haze of tears. Beneath the white hospital blanket Meredith's slim body was still, so unlike her usual exuberant and hyperactive personality. Had it only been six hours ago that Meghan had left left her sister alone on their sixteenth birthday? Had it only been this same evening that Meghan had chosen her friends over her family? What if she had stayed around? Would Meredith still be gone, or would Meghan have averted this successful attempt at suicide?Meghan reached beneath the blanket and removed the silver ring from Meredith's hand. She slipped it onto her own ring finger along with her own matching ring. Meghan's parents had given her and Meredith identical rings, two slim silver bands twined together, for a sixteenth birthday present and to honor how alike the girls were.I failed you, Meghan whispered to herself. I can't bring you back, but somehow I promise I will find a way to redeem my mista…

Wow! Here is is two weeks after I posted "Day One" and I haven't blogged since then. But I must tell you I am making progress on the novel. I gathered together what I have so far and done some revision. I brought a new chapter one to my critique group, "Tapestries" and incorporated some of their fantastic suggestions. I am now revising the prologue, to deepen it, and make it fit with this new draft.

I must say I am getting lots of help and motivation in writing this novel from Martha Alderson's book "The Plot Whisperer Book of Writing Prompts." The book assists in writing a novel by providing a daily dose of motivation, a hint about plot development and a specific plot prompt that gets your novel's draft moving along. Though most of my story is written and the ending is in my head, I find these prompts help me write my novel by keeping me on a daily writing regimen that helps me get to know my characters better, build backstory that I need to k…

Despite the fact that I began this novel in 2009 and have already written partial drafts of three different versions, I am beginning anew today. Writing a novel takes hard work, inspiration, time, a good plot, engaging characters and lots of surprises and twists. Without those ingredients in your novel writing stew it won't work.

So taking what I have from the latest iteration of this novel--which is 43 pages-- called "Safe Places" I am basically starting from scratch. And if writing a novel is like preparing a stew then before you cut up and blend the ingredients you have to get the ingredients.

I am following these steps in the first stage of writing this novel.

read the first chapter that was already written and revised it to make it stronger and have it make better sensewent online and found images of people to represent the characters in the book and added them to the character section of my novel writing workbookcreated a new story blueprint to solidify this version…

I admit I am one of the most scatter brained, distractible, and indecisive writer and artist in the world. One day scrapbooking, one day poetry and art journaling, next day short stories. But today will be different, and all the days ahead will be different as well.

First and foremost I am a novelist. My favorite thing to read is novels, not poetry or short stories. Within the fiction genre I prefer romantic suspense and thriller. I used to enjoy literary fiction but as I get older I need the fast pace and seat-of-my-pants reading experience I get from more commercial types of fiction. And as many writer, editors and agents admonish writers, you should write what you like to read because of cause you know and have integrated into your mind, the structure of that genre better than any other.

Indeed while writing craft books are an immense help, nothing can replace learning how to write by reading the kinds of books you want to write. I've read all the Hero's and Heroine's jo…

Trying very hard today to make some creative decisions. So far over this four day weekend I have made art, created some art stamping and scrapbooking, written a few poems and mentally worked out plots for a novella or novel written in short stories. All that plus some plot planning for my memoir.

How do I learn to focus in one creative area so I can build a career for my retirement?

Yes writing is my passion and all forms of art are my loves. With only so much time in the day I need to learn more focus.

So a few ideas:
Create a writing routine and follow it.
Come up with page quotas for each day
Work out my one month, six month, and one year writing goals

Renee Howard Cassese was born on Long Island on September 8, 1949. She lived in Levittown from the age of four to fourteen, which spanned the years of 1953 to 1963. These were years of such joy and magic that Renee wanted to share them with you. According to her, and her best friend, Emilia, there is no other time or place that afforded such an idyllic childhood. The security and simplicity of that childhood lives within both these women, even now, after over fifty years of friendship. There were many lessons to be learned in the stories of Renee's childhood and she wants to share them with her blog readers.

Renee works as a school administrator, but her love is for writing fiction and poetry and some memoir. She would love to teach women how to write and tell their own stories. Her dream and goal is to be a known published author.

Renee's joys in life are her family, reading, cooking and being outdoors in nature. She loves travel, but mostly travels to visit her sons who live on opposite US coasts.

Renee loves people and the interchange of ideas, but requires many and frequent periods of solitude and silence to stay calm.

She would love to hear your comments about the site, especially from others who grew up in Levittown, or who live there now.